Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Corina Machado has roundly rejected international suggestions for socialist President Nicolás Maduro to call for new elections or form a coalition government with the opposition after Maduro failed to provide verified results from the recent fraudulent election.
The left-wing presidents of Brazil and Colombia have suggested repeating elections in Venezuela, a country that has been driven into dire poverty and political repression by twenty-five years of socialist rule, first under Hugo Chávez and then his successor Maduro.
U.S. president Joe Biden told a press conference on Thursday that he also supported repeat elections. However, other White House officials walked back the president’s answer. On social media, the National Security Council said “We call for the will of the people to be respected & for discussions to begin on a transition back to democratic norms.”
In a video posted on social media, Machado said that Venezuela’s situation could not be compared to elections in other countries where government officials are not involved in crime.
“There are people who risked their lives to prove the fraud. People who have been murdered. Not to recognize this is a lack of respect. Popular sovereignty must be respected,” Machado stated in the video.
The Venezuelan opposition has published the counts from voting machines demonstrating a landslide victory for Edmundo González, the opposition’s presidential candidate. Their documentation also coincides with independent exit polls. While Maduro’s regime has claimed a slim victory for the president, it has not published official results from the voting machines.
Machado and González have repeatedly called for peaceful regime change without vengeance towards the current government and have offered Maduro safe passage to leave the country with his family.
Since the July 28th elections, Venezuelans have kept up the pressure on Maduro through protests and demonstrations despite the severe repression from his regime which has been enforced not only through widespread arrests but also the killings and kidnappings of protestors and opposition leaders.
